Ann Romney’s Dancing Horse

by | Jul 30, 2024 | Interesting | 1 comment

by Stevie J. West

It’s easy to mock things we don’t understand. The Left excels at this since their understanding of, well, most things is so limited. So it is to be expected then that rather than attempting to learn about the highly specialized sport of dressage, the Left descends into scathing mockery of Ann Romney’s “dancing horse”. As a thinking person, I find this obnoxious. As a horse trainer, I find it infuriating.

There is so much more to dressage than plopping on top of a “dancing horse” and riding it around the arena for a few minutes in time to music. Actually, I have only rarely agreed to take on the training of a competitive dressage horse because it is a lengthy and difficult commitment. A good dressage horse and rider team have years of professional training. It is not a hobby; it is a lifestyle. It requires serious dedication, great patience, and superior physical conditioning - both of the animal and the human.

While the graceful movements of a well groomed horse carrying a seemingly motionless rider look effortless, in fact it is something that requires strength and agility, both of the horse and rider. In order for the rider to get her horse to respond aids that should be imperceptible to spectators, the pair must be in harmony both physically and mentally. This process takes years of progressive training, starting with simple command of gaits and eventually culminating in the ability to perform complex choreography.

The rider must be able to use her weight, legs, and seat to cue her horse. This requires incredible strength and balance since she must aid her horse while when viewed from the side her ear, shoulder, hip, and heel are perfectly aligned and from the back she is sitting evenly on both seat bones. She asks her horse to move with very subtle body signals, which can be nothing more than shifts of her weight. The horse must be responsive, obedient, and energetic. None of this happens by accident.

Once a horse and rider have learned to move between gaits fluidly, work on the more difficult movements begins. The horse and rider are judged on how well they perform the following movements:

  • Extensions: The rider gives the command for the horse to lengthen his stride, usually at a trot. A horse performing this movement appears to be floating across the arena.
  • Pirouettes: The rider cues her horse to turn in place at a canter.
  • Piaffe: The horse trots in place in even rhythm. This is the movement with the highest degree of difficulty.
  • Lateral Movements: The horse first moves forward and then sideways, or part of his body sideways, depending on the cue from his rider.
  • Flying Changes: In this movement the horse appears to skip in a canter, switching the leading front and hind hooves.
  • Passage: Here the horse springs from one diagonal to the other while maintaining perfectly straight body line.
  • Counter Canter: The rider cues the horse to turn a bend on the incorrect lead.

When these movements are perfected, the result is as artful as it is athletic. Olympic level competition in dressage is much more than prancing about on a “dancing horse”. It is a very impressive accomplishment and is just as deserving of the respect given any other Olympic athlete.

 

 

@StevieJWest on: The Federalist, The Feminisn’t, and #WAR

by | Jul 12, 2024 | Interesting | 5 comments

guest post by Stevie J. West

Brooks Bayne calls himself “The Patriarchy”. Seriously.

It’s entirely possible that Brooks Bayne’s severe superiority complex could be passed off as a “joke”, at least with regards to the way he behaves toward women working with him. (It’s impossible to describe my time at The Trenches as working “for” Bayne, since unlike some of the men, I was never paid.) In any case, perhaps he believed that referring to himself as “The Patriarchy” in almost all communication with me was just a cute thing to do and took my replies in kind as the cutesy he was looking for instead of the mockery it was.

It is also entirely possible he truly sees himself as “The Patriarchy”, some kind of big strapping federalist who slays eunuchorns while flying the American flag upside down and patting women on their pretty little heads. Indeed, while I cannot be entirely sure because I lack the ability to rationalize the irrational, it seems that this is the more likely scenario. The longer we worked together, the deeper he spiralled into this delusion that the empty-headed female editor he “hired” was good for things like shielding The Patriarchy from accusations of sexism when we were targeting leftist females but not too useful for things like “thinking” or “having ideas”.

I have never suffered from the belief that being a woman puts me at a disadvantage. I find knee jerk accusations of sexism to be wildly obnoxious. I do not believe there exists a societal norm that inherently oppresses women and I certainly reject the stereotype of conservative misogyny that the Left loves to advance at every opportunity.

That’s why it is especially frustrating to see someone who claims to be on the Right live up to these stereotypes. So frustrating, in fact, that I hesitated to highlight it. I hate to give ammunition to the Left, which is why I initially decided to stay quiet about this, but it occurred to me it is not my discussing the behavior that provides the ammo. It is the behavior itself.

We are not leftists, which means we cannot embrace our radical fringe; we must distance ourselves from those who engage in antics that hurt, rather than help, our movement. We must denounce bigotry vehemently and swiftly cast aside any who claim to be on our side but insist on the validity of such vile behavior. After this culling of the herd is complete, when we have sent the message disagreement is welcome but hateful fanaticism will not be tolerated, we must refocus our energies on combating the cancer of leftism.

I have no intention of mentioning Brooks Bayne or The Trenches from this point forward. I would encourage everyone else to do the same; he doesn’t need our help destroying himself. He is doing a perfectly adequate job of imploding all on his own, and we have a war to wage.